


vicino a me, ancor ti sento

by himbostratus



Category: Ancient History RPF
Genre: Existential Crisis, Home Invasion, Lovers To Enemies, M/M, idk what antony was doing at this time so my best guess was committing war crimes in gaul, traditional roman views on sex, yeah theyre enemies but theyre also lowkey ride or die
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-07
Updated: 2019-05-07
Packaged: 2020-02-27 15:26:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18741799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/himbostratus/pseuds/himbostratus
Summary: antony has just come home from gaul, and brutus from cyprus.





	vicino a me, ancor ti sento

**53 B.C.E**

The sound of scrabbling against the outside of his home wakes Brutus up. His eyes open instantly, his breath stutters in his throat with alarm. He stares at the wall, not daring to move from his sleeping position on his side, curled around a pillow, one arm thrown across it with the insouciance of slumber. The room is filled with the grey light of an overcast morning, and bright shapes of light float seamlessly across the walls as the curtains twirl and wave in the cold morning breeze. It smells like rain. A small frown flicks on Brutus’s brow as he fails to remember falling asleep with the window open. Slowly, almost petrified, he looks over his shoulder at the window. Fingers curl over the sill, and another thump sounds as feet gain purchase on the wall.

With a ghastly silence, Brutus flies into action, abandoning the cradling warmth of his bed to stand in the shadows beside the drapes, a dagger in hand. He wills his breath to slow, watching in slow motion as the intruder vaults over the sill. A blood red cape proceeds him, stark against dark hair. Brutus’s eyes narrow as he wonders if someone has been sent to kill him.It’s a bit high to think of himself, he knows, as naught but a moneyer, but this city is as drastic as its politics, and with the turmoil of his present situation, nothing would surprise him at this point. The soldier walks with a slight favor of his left side, slight, noticeable unless one was looking. Unless someone knew to look.

“Antonius?” Brutus queries quietly. The man turns and he finds that it is true. Antony has grown some since he’s last seen him, or perhaps he is just more unkempt after a tour of Gaul. His hair is longer, seemingly darker, and a shadow of a few days darkens his cheeks. He has filled out his uniform more, and it seems his tunic has been cinched shorter. He is a specimen of a man, thorough and virile, handsome and able. Attractive as he may be, the discrepancy only serves to remind Brutus again that this is not who he once loved. Seeing him again leaves a sour taste in his mouth of their last meeting. 

“Marcus Brutus,” he smiles, and that has changed as well. It contains more teeth, more bite, more cruelty. He bares his teeth, no longer beaming in that idiotic way of a careless boy with a single dimple and two laughing eyes. He wrestles Brutus into a soldierly embrace, clapping his hands on his back in a way that is surely intended to be obnoxious. It startles the knife from Brutus’s hands, and he barely pays it a care as it clatters to the ground, except for his fear of rousing attention.

“Get off of me,” he commands, trying to wriggle out of Antony’s grasp as he’s peppered with kisses. Antony only squeezes harder as Brutus makes more space. He lets himself go limp for a moment, tolerating a particularly rough bite on his jaw and then makes his escape, wrenching himself free. He is still off - gait from the sudden arrival of old memories he thought had been buried in Gaul. Of course Antony survived. It isn’t to say that Brutus had been hoping for his demise, but life would certainly be easier for him if he had. As Brutus reached adulthood, he found that, in cases like these, purging was often the best way to remedy broken hearts and confused feelings that rotted in him like a corpse.

Antony doesn't pursue him. Instead, his interest is taken by Brutus's mess of a bed. He goes to stand by it, hand on one of the four wooden posters. “Have you replaced me so soon?” Antony asks as his gaze falls on the pillow Brutus had been holding onto in sleep. “Or is this just a surrogate for you to give your loving embrace?” Antony pulls the covers back, abandons his cloak to crumple on the floor, and falls into Brutus’s bed with a dangerous creak, still in his cuirass and sandals. The moneyer huffs slightly through his nose, thoroughly displeased with the soiling of his bedsheets. He tries not to think of where Antony’s sandals have been. (The muck and shit from Gaul to Subura.) The general opens the covers up in a silent offering. Brutus knows Antony will not settle for anything less than his presence, so he concedes with as much dignity as he can, crawling into bed. Antony turns on his side as he is joined, and Brutus places a hand on each side of him, coming to rest with his body curled around the soldier’s.

“That’s better,” Antony croons, pressing against him.

“Don’t speak.”

“I’ve missed my freshman mint master,” he continues as if Brutus said nothing at all. “I’m disappointed to hear that you’ve discontinued your career in poetry;  you made a name for yourself in Athens just to give it up for what? Tradition?”

Brutus ignores him. There once was a time where that would have been all Antony needed to say to worm his way under Brutus’s skin, but in the few years that they have been apart, he has reconstructed himself of harder stuff. “Surely there must be the bed of another that you can patronise ; Atia’s, Caesar’s, Volumnia’s, a venomous reptile’s?”

“I _am_ patronising the bed of the venomous reptile.”

Brutus rolls his eyes so thoroughly they ache in their sockets. “Then you mustn’t protest if I bite.”

Antony looks over his shoulder with a wicked gleam in his gaze that pins Brutus into petulant subordination. Perhaps Antony is a snake-charmer, but it is with no charm that he attracts nor deters the moneyer. Brutus can think of no name for what he is either than a slayer of beasts, of men, of kings, of hearts, of anything. He should have shut the window on Antony’s fingers when he had the chance, but such is the nature of  this dog ; feigning his charm until you’ve no option but to concede or be slain. “Why else would I lie about in a snake’s nest?”

 _Just to prove that you can walk away unscathed_ , Brutus thinks, but he wouldn’t dare say it aloud. It doesn’t matter whether he does or doesn’t, because Antony knows that they both know. _You are insolent because you think I am not willing to hurt you, or perhaps you think that I cannot afford to do so._ Brutus’s sharp brow narrows. Both reasons are true. “You came here to make a fool out of me.” _Like always. Why do I always lose at this game?_ Their relationship, or at least whatever ruin is left of it, is problematic to the highest order for someone of Brutus’s pedigree; thus, is that alone the basis of his association with Antony? Is he with him in spite of the prohibition, or is he happy because of it? Does he seek wholesomeness in their partnership, or does he only seek to spite those that lay claim to him by name or association? Is he with Antony to better himself, or to punish himself? His thoughts writhe incessant like some great serpent that has long tangled itself together, topaz eyes examining each scale for treason against the body, trying to find where it went wrong, where it all got tangle up and lost its way. Its tail trembles with aggravation, venom dripping from sleek fangs with rage, all the while slowly starving itself to death through self - constriction. What is it that Brutus hungers for?

“Not true,” Antony turns over fluidly, settling on top Brutus with the rough carelessness of old lovers. Brutus flexes his toes and he feels the mud from Antony’s sandals. He feels like he could strangle him now and soil the sheets entirely with his blood just for that. Antony rests his hand on the side of Brutus’s head and leans down to press a kiss sweeter than honey to his lips. He almost whimpers as old wounds are torn open once more with such speed and ferocity, the blood is too confused to flow. He pushes Antony away, trying to disappear into the bed. The soldier shifts back to sit on the bed and, without thinking, Brutus’s legs fall open to accommodate him closer. He reprimands himself harshly, but doesn't move away, letting him draw near enough to draw pink from Brutus's cheeks.

“Then to sodomise me? Is that it?” Brutus thinks back on the first time Antony had him that vile way with utter disdain. He should have never let himself be seduced into believing that to engage in such was not a lowly transgression but rather a testament of love and adoration. Legally, Brutus should be unable to vote, unable to represent himself in court, let alone serve as a moneyer. Letting Antony rut between his thighs had been bad enough, but giving him permission to enter him was an act of impropriety of the highest degree.

Antony’s face screws up in disgust. “I hate the way you talking about our lovema—”

“Don’t call it that.”

“Our fucking, then. And that isn’t why I came, either, but if that’s what you were expecting, I will certainly oblige you.”

“Why are you here?”

“For you, of course.”

Brutus’s eyes narrow with distrust. No one ever comes to Brutus without a favour to ask or a mistake point out or a grievance to right. Not Cicero or Caesar or Cato or even his own mother or sisters. All desperate to be Brutus’s friend for his semantics alone, nitpicking at who he is to benefit their own agenda. Brutus is used to being seen only as what he is, not who, but this squabble over his influence depresses him in an all - consuming way that leaves him cold and empty and hardly human. It makes knowing himself an impossibility when the clashing expectations of what he should be poison him like a tree riddled with blight, rotting from the inside out. For that reason, taking Antony’s words at face value is nothing short of an impossibility. “I don’t believe you,” he says, drawing away into himself.

“Then don’t,” Antony shrugs. “It’s been years since I’ve seen you, and I wanted to know what has become of my old friend Brutus.”

The moneyer looks up at him. “I am as you have left me.”

“In some ways, yes.” With little fanfare, Antony runs a hand down Brutus’s chest, pressing firm and present. He reaches the junction between his legs and feels the outline of his sex, letting his fingers curl around it gently, teasingly, his fingers almost soft when covered by the fine - spun wool of Brutus’s tunic. He doesn’t remember when Antony got so patient. “You still possess a terrible quality of tidiness. It’s obnoxious, I must say, how you tuck or clip each and every thread, or at least make it seem as if it was in your plan all along. Don’t look surprised ;  of course I keep up with what goes on in the Curia. I don’t know why I ever thought I could escape you.” His hand slips beneath Brutus’s tunic and grabs him freely. He sucks in a breath as rough, jutting callouses prick at his sensitive, warm flesh. It doesn’t stop him from growing erect with a dizzying quickness under Antony’s ministrations. “In other ways, you are very different. You cut your hair. I liked it longer,” he says. “You’ve become much more serious. I used to make you laugh easier ; you used to laugh at everything.”

“You were never that funny,” Brutus huffs, licking his lower lip quickly. His hips stutter.

“Ouch,” Antony says sarcastically and squeezes Brutus almost to the point of pain. A clear drizzle escapes the very tip of his arousal and dribbles onto Antony’s fingers. He releases Brutus for a moment and tastes the liquid on his finger. “You’re more bitter, too,” he decides. In the distance, thunder rumbles. Brutus wonders when Antony’s touch became so scalding, when his gaze singed his flesh. He doesn’t stop to think if it is him who has become frigid. Instead, he digs his nails into Antony’s flesh as he thrusts between his thighs held sideways, his hand still on Brutus’s sex. He would be erect even without it, the friction of their skin and the definition of Antony’s arousal stuffed in the tight junction of his legs, the sight of him bounding after his pleasure so freely, is enough to keep Brutus hard.

Brutus arches his back and clenches his legs. A moan shudders from deep in Antony;s chest without caution to the wind or care that passerbys mill beneath the window or that Cicero could be lurking in his own house. Antony’s hands press down on Brutus's hip roughly and he presses their foreheads together, breaths out of sync until lips come to lock together. He loses himself in his pleasure. His Stoic ideals are stripped as easily as his clothing, and all he wants is more. There may have been a time when he would have willed Antony to slow, to make it last, but now he is ravenous for this, so desperate that he does not have the chance to be surprised nor disturbed at how quickly Antony’s burning heat stoked the dying fire for him in Brutus’s heart. He wishes to be a youth again, when no faction but the confusing, constricting will of adults separated them, when their kisses were clumsy, and the only game they played was to see who could last the longest. Now, he doesn’t remember who spills first, only that they both do quickly, superficially, and that it is thick and cold on his flesh, running onto the sheets as Antony collapses beside him. The soldier talks indistinctly, but Brutus doesn't listen. He wishes Antony died in Gaul ; the solemn Brutus has always been better at grief than love anyway. 

Brutus cannot give this up, cannot let him go. Dis himself will have to pry his fingers from about Antony’s wrists, or damn it all and take them both.

**Author's Note:**

> idk what google translate translates the title as, but it means "close to me, once more i can feel you". also sorry for any tense changes or weird grammatical things. english is v confusing and not my first language


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